Becoming a great retail bank is a journey and not a destination.

UnionBank has been part of the annual festival since 2018, working the room with the biggest banks in the region. This year, more than 60,000 participants, more than 850 speakers, and more than 500 exhibitors attended the event, a testament to its status as the “world’s most impactful fintech event.”

The UnionBank delegation, headed by Chairman Erramon I. Aboitiz and President and CEO Edwin R. Bautista, showcased key business units that are the pillars of its digital journey through a two-story exhibit booth at the priority sponsors area of the expo. 

Union Bank of the Philippines (UnionBank) has always been among the first to embrace client-centric technological innovations, as a result it has consistently been recognized as of one of Asia’s digital trailblazers, ranking among the country’s top universal banks in terms of profitability and efficiency. It has garnered a record-breaking number of awards and recognition, such as the Most Recommended Retail Bank in Asia Pacific by BankQuality.com; 5-time Digital Bank of the Year by The Asset Triple A; Asia Pacific’s Digital Trailblazer by IDC Asia Pacific, and the Top 1 of Most Helpful Banks in the Philippines during COVID-19 by BankQuality.com.

UnionBank’s “Tech’d up” highlights at SFF2022

Day 1 

UnionDigital Co-Founder, President and CEO Arvie de Vera got the show on the road, joining as a panelist for the session titled "Wake Up With the Leaders," which focused on building a resilient business model in light of the current macro climate. 

UnionBank SVP and Head of Fintech Business Group, Open Finance and Digital Services Center of Excellence Erika Dizon-Go gave a presentation on Digital Finance before joining the session "The Antifragile Digital Economy of ASEAN - The Digital Pilipinas Case Study.” 

Capping off the Bank's Day 1 talks was the launch of the Philippine Open Finance Foundation led by Jaime Garchitorena, UBX Managing Director for Open Finance. The institution aims to make the adoption of open finance as a technology that empowers Filipino consumers with the right set of financial tools and solutions for their needs. The foundation will bring together relevant stakeholders, including other financial institutions, government agencies, non-government organizations, civic groups, and the academe to come up with meaningful initiatives that will support the development of Open Finance in the Philippines.

Day 2 

UnionBank SVP, SME and Micropreneurs Segment Head Jaypee Soliman gave a presentation on Embedded Banking and Alternative Credit Scoring 

UnionBank SVP and Head of Blockchain Center of Excellence and API Business Group Cathy Casas sat down for an interview with METACO, and IBM focused on "Leveraging Digital Assets to Build New Business Models for Financial Institutions." 

UnionBank's Chief Data and AI Officer Dr. David Hardoon joined a roundtable discussion entitled "Open Finance and Beyond," capping off the Bank's Day 2 talks. 

Day 3

Dr. Hardoon returned to join the roundtable discussion titled "Distributed Data Ecosystems in a Web3 World - Heterodox Approaches to Data Portability," followed by De Vera who joined the roundtable discussion titled "Asia Digital Banking CEO Strategic Roundtable."

UnionBank recorded a net income of Php2.6 billion in the first quarter of 2022. This translated to a return on equity of 9.2%.

The year-on-year (YoY) growth in recurring income was attributable to the following: 1) Net interest margin improved by 6bps to 4.6% brought about by higher yields in earning assets, coupled by lower cost of funds from the expansion of our CASA deposits; and 2) Fee-based income came from the growth of InstaPay charges and interchange fees. Higher foreign exchange income (up 53% YoY to Php369.5 million) also boosted our topline revenues. Versus 4Q2021, net income grew 40% mainly due to lower provisions for credit losses.

As of end-March 2022, total assets were at Php844.4 billion, 13% higher than the same period last year. Total loans and receivables were at Php351.8 billion, up 2% YoY. Total deposits were higher by 15% to Php577.2 billion primarily driven by the sustained growth of CASA deposits at 28% to Php356.5 billion.

“The optimism generated by the reopening of the economy is palpable and if the pandemic is behind us, we are hopeful that the economic gains since 2021 are sustainable. While the ongoing Russia-Ukraine conflict could adversely affect investor and consumer sentiment, we think that the country’s economic fundamentals are strong enough to weather the challenges ahead. We, therefore, remain optimistic that improving credit appetite and spending patterns will allow us to sustain momentum in our recurring income for the rest of 2022,” said Jose Emmanuel U. Hilado, Treasurer and Corporate Planning Services Head.

“I am happy to report that we are on track to achieve the strategic milestones that we have set for the year. For the acquisition of Citi’s consumer business, we have already obtained approvals from the Philippine Competition Commission and Insurance Commission. Our Stock Rights Offering, which will fund the acquisition, is already in motion and expected to conclude in May 2022. We remain confident to become the legal owner of the consumer portfolio by July 2022. Moreover, our digital bank UnionDigital, is also on-track to launch by the 2nd half of the year. We are closely working with the regulators to complete key requirements for the start of our operations,” said Edwin R. Bautista, President and CEO.

Aboitiz-led Union Bank of the Philippines (UnionBank) is widely-known to have been trailblazing many firsts in the country since it began operations forty years ago. UnionBank has always been among the first to embrace technological innovations to empower its customers into the future of banking. The Bank’s 40-year journey began with a simple vision: to become one of the top three universal banks in the country with respect to market capitalization, profits, and customer coverage.

In 1994, UnionBank acquired the International Corporate Bank, which marked the first of a series of acquisitions that would strengthen UnionBank's capabilities to deliver banking services tailored to the unique needs of Filipino customers.

In 2006, UnionBank purchased 98 percent of one of the top 20 largest banks in the country International Exchange Bank (iBank), making it the 7th largest private domestic commercial bank in the Philippines.

In its thrust to promote sustainable financial inclusion, the Bank entered into its first venture into rural banking and micro-financing by acquiring a majority stake in the Cebu-based First-Agro Industrial Bank (FairBank) in 2016.

In the same year, UnionBank embarked on its radical digital transformation journey, favoring expansion through digital channels over the traditional opening of more branches, while reinforcing its commitment to deliver superior customer experience and making a promise that ‘no one gets left behind’ to promote inclusive prosperity in the Philippines.

UnionBank was the first Philippine bank to introduce mobile banking through wireless application protocol-enabled cellphones, the first Philippine Bank to launch a banking website, first to use an online payment card through EON, first to use a chat bot (Talk to Rafa), first to launch its own stablecoin (PHX), first to introduce mobile check deposit through its award-winning app UnionBank Online, opened The ARK—the first fully digital bank branch in the country, launched UBX—the Bank’s fintech and corporate venture capital arm, leveraging ecosystems and data to explore new possibilities to make financial services more instinctive and accessible, the first Philippine bank to go fully on the cloud, and launched UnionDigital becoming the first publicly listed Philippine bank with a digital banking license.

Capping off the year 2021, UnionBank surprised the country with the announcement of a game-changing deal to acquire the consumer banking business of American banking giant Citi in the Philippines.  Seen as the largest transaction in the local banking community in recent years, UnionBank Chairman Erramon Isidro M. Aboitiz said, “This acquisition further cements our position as a leading bank in the Philippines, as well as fast-tracks our growth aspirations in the retail banking segment.”

Today as it ushers in its 40th year, UnionBank is globally-recognized by International Banker magazine as “already an unequivocal digital trailblazer in both the Philippines and Southeast Asia”, named ‘Asia Trailblazer Institution of the Year’ by Retail Banker International, and ‘Best Bank for Customer Experience in Southeast Asia’ from Global Brands Magazine, among many other international recognitions.

“Our success today has been a product of looking ahead into the future and preparing for the evolution of banking. We will continue to help ‘tech up’ customers, partners, institutions in line with our ‘Tech Up, Pilipinas’ aspiration, empowering all of us to weather this pandemic and emerge more resilient than ever. Together, we can be future forward and leap to being a bank of enduring greatness,” said UnionBank President and CEO Edwin R. Bautista.

In a bid to aid the victims of Typhoon Odette in their journey toward recovery, Union Bank of the Philippines (UnionBank) recently deployed its "Bank on Wheels" (BOW) mobile banking facility in Cebu, to provide customers with easy access to much needed basic financial services.

BOW is UnionBank's 5G-capable banking kiosk in a van, designed to bring the Bank's trailblazing technology and innovation directly to its customers. It is a mobile version of its first-in-industry fully digital banking branch, The ARK, allowing customers to experience the features of the said branch potentially anywhere in the country.

With the cash recycler machine (CRM) also inside the kiosk, the Cebuano UnionBank customers were in addition to the transactions mentioned earlier, were able to do card-less withdrawal as well as cash deposit for both carded and card-less transactions. Non-UnionBank cardholders, on the other hand, were able to do balance inquiries and cash withdrawals.

“In the wake of Typhoon Odette’s devastation, many banking customers in Cebu and other affected areas were left with little to no access to basic banking services. Committed to address this urgent concern, we deployed BOW while we worked on restoring the bank’s ATM network in these areas,” said UnionBank’s SEVP, CTOO and CTO Henry Aguda.

In the aftermath of the typhoon, UnionBank's ATM availability in disaster-stricken areas was cut to only 21 percent. But through the Bank's agility and superior digital banking capabilities, availability of its ATMs was up to 64 percent after just one day. As of writing, 97 percent of the Bank's ATMs in the said areas are now operational.